Samenvatting

By means of the economic analysis of strategic behavior it is attempted to elucidate the decision making on peace support operations of the armed forces. The analysis reveals that the choice between peace keeping based on the supposed agreement of the parties involved in the conflict - and peace enforcing on the basis of escalation dominance is systematically distorted by the collective good character of the intervention. Besides, the implicit economic-game theoretical interpretation of many conflicts as a problem of communication provides a justification for the inadequate employment of resources by the world community.